The SA Friends of the Beit Halochem Zahal Disabled Veterans Organisation was established in Johannesburg in 1982, its primary goal being to help and support Zahal disabled veterans by raising funds to help them return and resume their normal lives as soon as possible.

Generous Killarney Mall shoppers and retail sponsors have managed to collect one-years-worth of stationery for Thembelenkosini Care Givers in Soweto, part of an ongoing initiative to support the centre.

There’s a popular weekly satirical show in Israel called Eretz Nehederet. In a recent episode, an actor playing Benny Gantz, the former Chief of Staff of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) and newcomer to Israeli politics, is asked how he’s feeling.

Devotion to the cause of the State of Israel flourishes in the most unlikely places, even in societies where the Jewish presence is small to non-existent. Such is the case in Mozambique, where the work of Beth-El Associacao Crista Amigos De Israel - Mozambican Christian Friends of Israel - testifies to how much can be achieved by those inspired by their Christian faith to promote the Israeli cause, despite adverse conditions.

JNF’s unique “Blue Boy Box” now lives at King David Linksfield Pre-Primary so that children of each generation learn the importance of tzedakah (charity or welfare). It is the responsibility of Jews all over the world to build Israel, develop it and nurture it as the home of the Jewish nation

“Knowledge is Light” was our school motto when I was a child in Durban. The importance of education was made clear to us from as far back as I can remember. It wasn’t taken for granted. A good education was a privilege.

How to fight terrorism while at the same time not encourage it is a challenge Israel continues to grapple with. Last Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that he was enacting the so-called “terrorist salaries law” for the first time. It allows Jerusalem to deduct from the monthly taxes it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority (PA) those monies it claims go towards terrorism.

(JTA) After the New England Patriots beat the favoured Kansas City Chiefs to reach their third straight Super Bowl – their amazing ninth in less than 20 years – CBS sports analyst Boomer Esiason made an intriguing statement, namely that Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman belongs in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

I can’t bear bullies! I know I am not alone in having a serious aversion to anyone or any group who tries to make themselves feel better by making others feel bad about themselves. I can’t stand people who push others around just because they are not able – for whatever reason – to stand up to them.

We have all heard the term before, and either flinched, cringed, or nodded our heads. The words “apartheid Israel” have become a term so often used in the discourse around Israeli-Palestinian conflict that we have somewhat lost our ability to think critically about its use.

With Prince William’s historic visit to Israel this week, all eyes have been trained on the Jewish capital. It may have taken 70 years, but the first official visit by a member of the British Royal family began in Israel on Monday, when William, the Duke of Cambridge, arrived in Tel Aviv.

Some 5 600 emissaries (shluchim) from Chabad-Lubavitch from all over the world gathered at the Pier 8 warehouse in Brooklyn, New York this week for the opening of their four-day annual international conference and banquet, 75 years after the arrival of the Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, from Europe.

It boggles the mind. Why is so much Torah-coverage given to the subject of an elaborate tent-structure called the tabernacle? The verses that relate to the tabernacle’s construction seem to go on and on. They fill not one, but four weekly portions.

“The greatness of our nation is that our people are great. We are a nation of heroes, of people with good and decent moral fibre who will not tolerate our country being plundered!” So said Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein in Pretoria this morning.“This is a struggle for accountability and justice,” Goldstein told the crowd (which included prominent Jewish CEOs like Adrian Gore, Stephen Koseff and Michael Katz). “This struggle is about sovereignty. The power of the people always triumphs in the end.”

Catch up with old friends and family – download the SA Jewish Association of Canada (SAJAC) Pesach publication – what a great read this is for local and other expat SA Jews worldwide. This 112 page Pesach edition of SAJAC NEWS is the first that Jewish Report will carry, but by no means the last. We have agreed to continue publishing the biannual publication on an ongoing basis. This is the first time in their 40-year history that SAJAC NEWS will be available online.

Bernie Sanders, the independent American Democratic Party hopeful, won the two nominating contests in Washington State and Alaska by huge margins on Shabbos, reducing the delegate gap with Hillary Clinton, the front-runner in the race for the Democratic presidential nod, to less than 300 delegates.

Hear out Donald Trump. Ignore Donald Trump.
There were two distinct approaches to the Trump moment this week at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s (AIPAC) annual conference here, and there were mutual warnings that one or the other side would get burned.

An extraordinary series of developments are bringing new hope - and new heartbreak - to the family and colleagues of Alberto Nisman, the Argentine federal prosecutor who was found dead last year just days after accusing then-President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner of covering up Iran's role in the 1994 bombing of this city's AMIA Jewish Centre.

The brouhaha surrounding Dr Uri Davis - who on a speaking tour of South Africa last week, called upon this country to declare the Jewish National Fund an illegal organisation - may have a slightly different spin, but is nothing new to South Africans.

Ahead of this week Tuesday’s critical primary contests in five states, three of which - Ohio, Illinois and Florida - have substantial Jewish communities, Israel had prominently emerged as a presidential campaign issue. In a heated exchange in the Republican debate last week in Miami, front-runner Donald Trump was hammered by his opponents for saying he would be a neutral broker of Israeli-Palestinian peace. Trump defended his position as essential to achieving a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.

A dinner-table conversation led to Herzlia pupils telling potential foreign investors in the hallowed “Old Chamber” of Parliament why they should believe in the future of SA. English teacher Gail Simon told Cape Chamber of Commerce’s Michael Bagraim how her students’ orals on the future of SA were so positive. Last week's trial was so popular that there’s another next week. Herzlia’s Director of Education, Geoff Cohen, told JR today that he was thrilled. “They did themselves and their school and families proud,” he said. READ MORE AND SEE THE PICTURES...

South African-born Neil Turok is the recipient of the 2016 John Torrence Tate Award for International Leadership in Physics from the American Institute of Physics. The award will be presented to him in November in Silicon Valley, California.

In an astonishing display of generosity, the winners of the gold and silver medals in the scholar classical section of the 5th South African International Ballet Competition (SAIBC), have donated their winnings - prizes valued at R7 500 and R5 000 respectively - back to South Africa.